THE PUBLIC EDITOR; Scoops, Impact or Glory: What Motivates Reporters?

By Byron Calame

Published: December 3, 2006

SOME readers are convinced that certain reporters at The New York Times are motivated solely by partisan politics. A New Jersey reader's March e-mail, for example, described one reporter as a ''GOP operative/hack-writer'' who ''uncritically sounds his party's theme today in a piece about the 2008 campaign.'' But a Florida reader contended in a September e-mail that the anti-Bush political bias of the same Times staffer and a colleague ''is in their DNA.''

My reviews of these two stories turned up no bias. More important, however, my stint as The Times's public editor and my 39 years at a competitor lead me to conclude generally that reporters and editors in the newsrooms of major newspapers are not motivated by a devotion to any political party or cause. It just isn't in their DNA.

So what does motivate newspaper reporters? Based on the hundreds of reporters with whom I've worked and competed, I've sorted out several major driving forces -- and considered the potential dangers to good journalism those forces can present. As a reality check, I talked to a half-dozen Times reporters and a half-dozen editors with decades of experience at The Times and other major newspapers. In an effort to avoid righteous platitudes about newspapering, I promised confidentiality to these journalists.

Two caveats bear mentioning. Reporters in newsrooms across the country can be driven by many different factors, and they aren't necessarily motivated by all of the ones I'm holding up. While editors are driven by many of the same factors that motivate reporters, the differences are sufficient to force me to focus on the people who gather the news.

Being first with new facts or fresh insights.

The drive to be first with the basic facts of a newsworthy development remains embedded in the culture of newsrooms and in the minds of reporters. The daily news cycle of the print version of The Times continues to get top priority on many exclusive articles, although a growing number are being published online during the day. The obvious signal to reporters: Old-fashioned scoops still count.

But ''intellectual scoops'' -- stories with new insights that are lauded on a regular basis by Bill Keller, the executive editor -- are what reporters increasingly view as a more vital way to be first. As one editor told me in an interview, ''When you can look at all the dots everyone can look at, and be the first to connect them in a meaningful and convincing way, that's something.''

Evidence of the continuing reportorial passion to be first, with facts or insights, emerges clearly when reporters think a competitor hasn't appropriately credited them with being out in front. They often demand that their editors seek a correction from the competing publication. In one of my earliest brown-bag lunches with Times staffers, a reporter reminded me that I had refused a year or so earlier, while still an editor at The Wall Street Journal, to publish a correction conceding that he had been first on a story.

The dangers to readers of a rush to be first are obvious. Accuracy can suffer, and a fresh insight can be left without the convincing example that another day of reporting could have produced. And cheap scoops about, say, some routine presidential appointment to be announced the next day are of little real value to readers.

Pursuing stories that can have impact.

All reporters want to write articles that people talk about -- but some are driven to journalism that produces corrective action or beneficial changes. Two major goals of these reporters are to hold the powerful accountable and to right wrongs. (These two goals embody what motivated me to become a journalist.)

''Holding those with power accountable as to how they use it'' is a key part of the watchdog role of the press, one reporter told me. ''That's why I got into this.'' Another reporter spoke of giving ''voice to people who don't have a voice'' and getting a ''chance to afflict some who are unjustly comfortable.'' These comments are from reporters who practice what they preach.

Righting wrongs in society is a motivation that sometimes gets boiled down in newsroom shorthand to ''catching bad guys.'' It's what motivates many investigative reporters to spend months digging into wrongdoing -- sometimes before law enforcement officials have detected trouble. But another reporter, also motivated to right wrongs, may pursue a story that shows a person has been unjustly convicted of a crime.

A major downside risk with these motivations, factoring in the strong egos common among reporters, is that a reporter's zeal can turn into a crusade that corrupts the impartiality of the journalism. Another risk is the temptation to push for follow-up articles about the impact of the coverage that present details well beyond what readers really need to know.

Winning prizes.

Reporters are most reluctant to acknowledge that their journalism is driven by the desire to win a prize. The criteria for many journalism contests, however, favor stories that cause change or make waves. So reporters motivated to pursue such stories -- and their editors -- are inevitably weighing the prize possibilities. Certain prizes can bring reporters numerous benefits, including greater freedom in choosing future topics to pursue -- in itself a key motivation for some reporters.

Impressing sources.

The better reporters assigned to a beat or specialized area of coverage are likely to cultivate the better sources, including experts on the subject. Such reporters will write certain articles that will be viewed as unfavorable by some sources. Yet many of the journalists remain highly motivated to impress their sources with the accuracy, fairness and depth of their work. Beat reporters, after all, typically get more feedback from their sources than from readers, and the respect of those experts looms large for them.

''This, of course, can become dangerous, if it leads reporters to write for their sources rather than for the broader public,'' one editor said to me, but ''that sometimes happens.''

Reporters acknowledge the motivation to impress sources. ''I'm prepared for their anger, but not their contempt,'' one told me. Another said: ''It can be a huge motivation if a source says, 'You nailed it.' But I have to keep in my mind that I'm not writing for the wonks.''

Figuring out what's really happening.

A fundamental motivation of reporters is the curiosity that drives them to get to the bottom of a confusing or complicated situation and find patterns that help explain it to readers. Making sense out of chaos -- especially when you can do it first -- is something many reporters find very rewarding.

''It's the anomalies of life, the thing that didn't happen, that prompt you to ask why,'' said one reporter. ''You try to figure out what the machinery is underneath the development and try to find accurate, meaningful patterns.'' This kind of curiosity can also foster a healthy skepticism in the newsroom and help keep cynicism at bay, both pluses for readers.

Telling stories in a compelling way.

There are two motivations (and often fairly strong egos) at work here. One is the desire of almost all reporters to tell an important story so that it will be read to the end. The other is the satisfaction, or even delight, that many reporters derive from good writing of the kind that can move readers to laugh or to cry.

When the reporting has turned up a compelling story, one editor said, the reporter's motivation is to ''write about it so compellingly that you know the reader can't put your story down. That's a storyteller's ethic -- and storytelling is an honorable thing, and has been since men and women lived in caves.''

Many reporters find themselves motivated to search for the right words. One spoke of finding ''an unseemly delight'' in simply producing what he felt was ''a good phrase.'' His passion for good writing is also stoked any time someone quotes from one of his stories in conversation, he said.

Getting on the front page.

While it's no longer a dominant motivation, the hope of turning up a really big story that will make it to the front page never seems that far from the minds of many reporters. As newspapers make the transition to the Web, the importance to reporters of landing on Page 1 will probably fade as readers gain the capability to customize the kinds of stories delivered to them.

When it comes to summing up what motivates reporters, I was most intrigued by the concise list provided by a candid reporter who responded to my question by quickly ticking off four motivations:

''The superego, the public service part. The id and mischief making, say something that will get people's attention. Reporting is surprisingly fun. Bosses and sources.''